June 8, 2018

University Police receives grant funding for lifesaving equipment

The Gladys M. Rickard Charitable Trust has awarded Northwest Missouri State University and its University Police Department with grant funds amounting to $7,500 to purchase lifesaving equipment that will enhance officers’ responses to potentially dangerous situations.

The equipment includes helmets with shields and vests designed to protect officers confronting an active shooter or civil disturbance. The equipment also enhances officers’ abilities to respond to such situations.

“This critical equipment allows us the ability to respond in a more efficient way and provide a level of safety to our officers who are responding as well as to those folks who they are saving,” University Police Chief Clarence Green said.

Northwest serves as the lead agency for armed intruder training for all law enforcement agencies within the region, and the University Police Department proactively educates Northwest students and employees about “Run, Hide, Fight,” a national model for responding to a hostile intruder.   

In spring 2017, Northwest developed and led a full-scale exercise involving an armed intruder, and the new equipment was identified as a need during after-action reviews of the exercise.

Green, who will oversee the implementation of the new equipment, said the University Police Department trains for hostile intruder situations three times a year, in addition to quarterly firearms training.

Northwest’s University Police Department serves all students, faculty, staff and visitors on the campus. All of its police officers are state-certified and have commission that extends their authority throughout the state of Missouri. Since its operations began more than 50 years ago, the department has progressed into a national leader in campus law enforcement and prevention-based policing practices. Today, the department is responsible for police services, emergency planning and coordination, emergency communication, parking management, student security and transportation services on the campus.

University Police also operates Safe Ride Home, a shuttle bus service established at Northwest in 2004 to provide safe and timely transportation service within the city limits of Maryville. The service, in coordination with Northwest’s University Police Department, is offered for students, by students, and has significantly reduced the number of harmful driving situations, including driving while intoxicated, in the community by 65 percent.

Green, who has served as chief since 1997, is acknowledged as a community leader in subject matters ranging from emergency planning to threat assessment, and his service on the Missouri Governor’s Task Force for School Safety, as well as his leadership on campus, have helped Northwest achieve a drop in violent crime on campus by 20 percent.

Furthermore, Maryville has been recognized for three consecutive years by SafeWise, an online resource for home security and safety information, as one of the “Safest College Towns in America.”